The 'occupywallst' project's description reads: 'Stomping out capitalism, one line of code at a time'. Is that truly the goal; to eradicate capitalism?
My confusion stems from the fact that political corruption and the plight of the middle class have less to do with 'capitalism' (an economic theory involving free markets) and more to do with 'some people are evil.' There seems to have been as much 'political corruption' and 'middle class stomping' in the Soviet Union and they didn't actually have capitalism as an economic theory. That is why it confuses me when capitalism seems to be the target.
The institutions in the US that protect citizens have been under served by people who they represent. That I get. How many times have you heard someone ask for ideas for 'avoiding doing jury duty' or 'only one loser is running for school board seat 12'. Those institutions, the justice system, local governments, are the pre-cursor institutions of Congress and federal departments.
What is more impressive to me is that you have to let someone serve who gets elected and a lot of places you can get elected just by throwing your name in the hat (I'm talking various cities and counties around the US, no Congress).
So why isn't it "OccupyLocalGovernment" ? Then you could do stuff like prevent disasters of Bell California [1]. You know, "Think nationally, serve locally." kind of thing. Get some experience running the city, move up to the county, then state, then you'll be well trained and positioned to run for Congress and fix things. Frankly if folks did that it would scare the crap out of the New American Century types.
[1] http://www.ktla.com/news/landing/ktla-more-high-bell-salarie...
The power of local government is amazing. What is even more inspiring is how local sherifs, mayors, etc can effect 'big' public policy (immigration for example) by refusing to enforce laws from the state (or fed).
Because the way it is allows me to completely regard the participants as a bunch of socialist misfits. And maybe they don't want that.
If the goal isn't to 'stamp out capitalism' then it shouldn't say so. Because that meaning is pretty plain to the rest of us.
If it's 'stop cronyism and corruption and the assault on the middle class', I would suggest that it gets amended.
If you were to imagine OWS without anti-capitalism, it would look like a bunch of libertarians. A Tea Party devoid of religious sentimentalism.
In a way, it's a very clever and convenient strategy: With no common goals stated, they are free from the obligation to engage in informed debate (with others or themselves), and anyone opposing the movement can (correctly) be accused of not knowing what they are talking about.
Personally, I sympathise with many of the grievances voiced by the movement, but I am certain that it eventually will get run over by the professional anti-capitalists, which I can't support.